ON SUPERFICIAL INSPECTION. both these periodicals have a similar flavour: eclectic. at times eccentric. greenish. serving similar worthy causes. In the case of Perspectives. “European identities. autonomies and initiatives”. in that of 4WR. “small nations. small communities and the human spirit”. Indeed. both have a similar purpose. to offer. now that Marxist Communism is apparently in eclipse. an alternative to by what Professor J.R.R.
Tolkien memorably termed “Americo-cosmopolitanism”
An alternative founded not. as Communism was. on the creating of a rival planet-spanning homogenous monolith of centralised power. but on fostering the springing up everywhere and empowerment of diverse. locally based communities. In seeking such an alternative both periodicals range more or less widely. 4WR features phone number list articles from. or about. E.F. Schumacher. Professor Leopold Kohr. Peter Cadogan. and sundry factions within European and American Green Parties. LeGuin. from Princess Natalie d’Arbeloff to ex-Labour leader Michael Foot’s wife Jill Tweedie.
Perspectives traverses an even broader
From J.R.R. Tolkien to electronic rockers Kraftwerk; from Proudhon to Wyndham Lewis; from Marco Tarchi of the Italian New Right to the Green anarchist Richard Hunt; from Basque culture to Modernism in art. to the Gulf War. to spending all your time and energy directly on your email marketing the significance of the Spaghetti Western. to European separatist struggles from Scotland to Silesia. Both publications lapse at times from eclecticism into sheer eccentricity. For 4WR this is largely a reflection of the personality of its editorial driving force. John Papworth.
Thus half a page is devoted to canonising
The first reader to renew his subscription. whilst subscription rates themselves appear to depend on the possession or otherwise by the putative subscriber of shirts. false teeth. dishwashers and wall-to-wall carpets. Several pages of each issue are also devoted to a discussion of Mr.Papworth’s recent social activities. with notable name dropping and rather “luvvieish” anecdotes of how simply charming it was to share nut-cutlet s whatsapp filter with so- and-so at such-and-such a worthy function.
Perspectives is less personally idiosyncratic; it is produced by a writers’ collective. who refrain from sharing with us a list of the people they have met and pubs they have drunk in (Perspectives is. I think. more real ale than nut-cutlet in its authorial flavour). But it too has on occasions wandered into curious byways and peculiar digressions.